Vivid Past
by koalatygirl
Summary: A piece expanding on Sarah and Helena's relationship after Helena starts living with Sarah, and how Sarah tries to help Helena to sleep through the night and deal with her inner demons.


Sarah wakes to a flow of constant mumbles from the room next to hers and for a moment tries to sleep through it, a bit irritated more than anything. Constantly worrying about Kira's safety leaves little room for peaceful sleep, so she attempts to ignore it before she jolts upright from her bed, realizing Helena is talking to someone, and Sarah has to be sure that Kira still slept soundly in her own room. Sarah doubts her sister would consciously do anything to harm Kira, but Helena's actions and feelings are bound in one unpredictably wild part of herself that makes her dangerous, no matter the good of her intentions. So Sarah shuffles her covers aside and creeps up to Helena's door.

Sarah peers into the room through the cracked-open door to see Helena sitting on the bed, facing the wall, and gathers that Helena's only audience is her shadow, whose disheveled, black hair spills out onto the ceiling. The lamp's light from the nightstand behind Helena glowed yellow, making her hair more golden than the pale color it usually is. Helena's voice is soft, yet still throaty sounding, and her words gurgled together, making Sarah unable to understand more than the few words "fearfully and wonderfully made". Sarah's arm leans into the door, pushing it open wide enough for her to slide through. Her shadow, cast from the lamp, dances along the wall Helena faces and slides up to the ceiling, but Helena's murmurs continue without her noticing.

"Helena?" Sarah whispers, carefully trying not to startle her. It hasn't even been a full month since Helena started living with Sarah and some things still trigger her to react instinctually defensively, presuming all unexpected situations as a threat. It contributes to Sarah's lack of trust with Helena when it comes to Kira.

Upon hearing her sister's voice, Helena stands up and turns to the door before she can stop mumbling. Sarah raises her arms halfway, knowing that the visual of nothing in her hands would help Helena focus on Sarah herself, rather than the possibility of a threat.

"Sarah," Helena says after a calculating moment. "I am sorry. I did not want to wake you up from your sleep." She settles back down at the foot of the bed as Sarah's arms lower slowly from their position in the air. The guilt for waking Sarah plays at Helena's eyes as they fall to her bare feet on the floor.

"You didn't," Sarah lies, protecting her sister from a guilty conscience and walking closer to the bed with more relaxed steps. "I was getting some water when I heard you." Helena raises her head to look up at Sarah, but she doesn't say anything. A few silent seconds fill the room before Sarah asks, "What are you doing up this late?"

Helena shifts uncomfortably from where she sat and pulls her legs under herself. "I do not want to sleep."

Sarah knows she must be tired. Helena starts walking through the house hours before everyone else wakes up, looking at the framed pictures of Kira, Felix, and Sarah on the walls before Sarah had given her photo albums to flip through that Helena looks at from the kitchen table. Sometimes Sarah hears her throwing the photo books at the floor, which is almost always followed by soft cries of "separated" and "my seestra". Sarah never confidently reaches out to comfort Helena when she rages wars with her past because she fears that any help she could offer might somehow distort the fragile trust they recently acquired, knowing that predicting Helena's reactions to anything is wishful thinking. Helena only retires to her bed after everyone else already had, too. Often times she would wait until everyone fell asleep and read books of Kira's that she had gradually began to collect in a stash under her bed, which Alison had found while she was cleaning on her visit. It starts to dawn on Sarah that she's never actually seen Helena sleep before.

"Helena, you sleep after everyone goes to bed, yeah?"

Helena's eyes retreat back to her feet, followed by her head that lowers enough for her wild blonde hair to fall forward, covering most of her face from where Sarah stands. "I don't like to sleep."

Sarah takes the last couple steps to the bed and sits down, leaving an open space between her and her sister, but she comes close enough for Helena to refocus her eyes on Sarah's face. "So, you don't sleep?" Sarah asks, half confused, but also somewhat impressed. If only she could stay awake all the time to be sure Kira is always safe.

"Only when I have to," Helena admits. "The nightmares can only hurt me when I go sleeping."

Sarah wonders how long Helena manages without any sleep. Sure, Helena seems edgy and doesn't actually look well-rested, but that's just how Helena is. Sarah hasn't thought any of this were consequences of poor sleeping habits. Suddenly, Helena's physical health became a pressing problem on Sarah's list of worries, especially if whatever's got Cosima sick is going to catch up to one of them soon.

"Helena, what if I laid in here with you. If you start having a nightmare, I'll wake you up." Helena considers Sarah's offer for a second before jerking her head into a nod. Then she flops down on her back from her spot on the bed, with her feet and most of her legs dangling off the edge. "You might want to put your head on the pillow, Meathead. Get off the bed for a minute," Sarah instructs as she stands up, pulling the covers back with her. Helena follows her sister and waits until Sarah pats the pillow next to her.

Helena crawls back into the bed, making sure her head lands on the pillow her sister touched. "Sarah, when will you know when I am having a nightmare?" She asks, fear leaking into her question with her voice wavering on the last word.

Sarah brings the blankets back over herself and Helena. She figured she would just wake up if Helena showed any signs of restless sleeping, but she doesn't want to tell Helena that she can't actually stop her from having a nightmare, only that she could cut them short, but she knew Helena needed to sleep, so she settles down next to her sister after answering, "Because I'm you're twin. I'll just know."

Helena nods again, believing Sarah without doubting her. It's very nice of Sarah to help her sleep without nightmares, because Helena's exhaustion brimmed at the tipping point since she so determinedly aims to avoid reliving her past with Thomas that haunts her when she succumbs to unconsciousness. She wishes that she could do something nice for Sarah in return, but Helena's actions, good intentions or not, mostly result in Sarah's frustration, and Helena's thoughts always linger on the moments that tear her and her twin apart.

"Sarah," she whispers into the darkness, recalling a memory that haunts her more than anything Thomas did. "I am sorry. I am sorry about Mother."

Sarah sighs audibly, but doesn't turn her head. "Helena, I don't want to talk about Amelia. Just go to sleep, yeah?"

Sarah feels the movement of Helena's quick nod of the head and the slight shuffle of the blankets as Helena turns away, lying partially on her side. Even though she can't see the few tears that slide down Helena's cheeks, sympathy still pits Sarah's stomach. She refuses to reach out to comfort Helena, even when she knows the guilt is clouding her sister's thoughts. For the most part, Sarah has forgiven Helena for Amelia. But she will never forget.

Sarah turns on her side too, bringing the blankets close to her neck. She listens to Helena's breaths as they even out into slow, rhythmic intervals. It relaxes Sarah's anxiety that settles inside every night before she falls asleep. She worries about Alison's sanity, Cosima's health, Kira and Felix's safety, and she worries about Helena. Worries that her past demons are too damaging to ever let her live without fearing the rest of the world, but hearing Helena's breathing slipping into a soft snore calms the worries one exhale at a time until her eyelids close and the worries stop completely.

Slowly, Sarah's breaths starts to match Helena's until their chests rise and fall in synchronization, and for once they finally have a place where peace can find them while they sleep, at least for a little while. By the time soft mumbles escape Helena's lips, the space between the two of them shrank enough for Sarah to feel the vibrations of her sister's rough voice run from Helena's throat to Sarah's shoulder. It resurfaces her consciousness. She tries to gauge the intensity of Helena's dream by concentrating on the words she spoke, which is a nearly impossible task when she remembers that she can't understand the Ukrainian garble streaming from Helena's dream.

When she looks at Helena, carefully propped up on her elbow, she exhales and slides the back of her fingers over Helena's forehead, brushing the hair from covering her cheek that shifts from the foreign words sputtering from her mouth. Despite all the terrible things Helena's done, Sarah refuses to acknowledge the childish face of innocence lying next to her could even be capable of such things. Maybe she could forget the past. She's never seen Helena this calm before. All the horror that presses down on Helena during the day, constantly forcing her eyes to skip around, never able to stay focused on one thing too long before the image conjures a painful feeling, have left her completely. She's never seen Helena so still. It makes her as vulnerable as Sarah's ever seen her. More so than when she had found Helena locked in that rusty cage. Because Sarah knows that Thomas will never hurt her sister again. But the memories of Thomas threaten to break the little mental stability Helena has left. And there's nothing Sarah can do stop it.

And that thought plays at the back of Sarah's mind until Helena's quiet murmurs quickly escalate into terrified screams.

"Helena!" Sarah gasps, yet still trying not to shout. Putting her hands on both sides of her twin's face, Sarah calls out Helena's name again, making Helena spring upright, pulling her out of her nightmare. Her eyes open wide, full of tears that brim over onto her cheeks as she gasps incoherent pieces of the dream fresh from memory. She puts her hands over Sarah's, making sure the hands are real, and lets her sister's face replace the images she wants to forget as the frame of her body shakes.

"Helena?" Sarah asks softer, but the worry still creeps into her voice. Helena's cheeks, shining from tears, fall to rest on Sarah's shoulder. "You're okay, you're okay" Sarah coos to her sister, convincing herself that one day she might be. At times during the day, Helena would slip into this place where the fear filled her eyes and frozen her in place in flashes of unwanted memories and thoughts, but they passed before Sarah could doing anything about them, even if she felt confident enough to. But feeling her sister shake under her hands strikes the sister inside her. Because Helena is _hers _and Thomas broke her. She wishes she could make Thomas pay for it all over again, but this time she wouldn't let him rot in a cage. It isn't satisfying enough. But she can't erase Helena's past, so she brings her arms around her sister, one stroking her hair and one rubbing her back, trying to soothe her like she'd comfort Kira in similar situations. "You're okay, you're okay."

Sarah holds Helena until the sobbing and shuddering faded into a calmer pattern of inhales and exhales. Sarah lays Helena back down, pulling the sheets all the way up to Helena's neck and letting her hand to sift through Helena's hair one last time while telling her, "I'm right here, yeah? Nothing's gonna happen to you."

Helena nods, closing her eyes, and taking her sister's hand once she lies down next to her, and Sarah lets her, squeezing her hand in return. Helena's never been more of a broken child to Sarah, and she begins to realize with each passing day that she might be the only one who can fix her. When Helena's breathing simmers into a snore once again, hands still twined together, Sarah whispers to her sister, "I love you, too" and decides that she can forget what Helena's done, but fears that Helena will always remember.


End file.
